Visual imagery commonly can be classified as either a static image (e.g., photograph, painting, etc.) or dynamic imagery (e.g., video, animation, etc.). A static image captures a single instant in time. For instance, a static photograph often derives its power by what is implied beyond its spatial and temporal boundaries (e.g., outside the frame and in moments before and after the photograph was taken). Typically, a viewer's imagination can fill in what is left out of the static image (e.g., spatially and/or temporally). In contrast, video loses some of that power, yet by being dynamic, video can provide an unfolding temporal narrative through time.
Another category of visual media that mixes a static image with temporal elements has recently become more prevalent. A classic example is an animated Graphics Interchange Format (GIF), originally created to encode short vector-graphics animations within a still image format. Another common example is simple panning and zooming over large static imagery, sometimes referred to as the Ken Burns effect, which is often used in image slideshows.
A further example of visual media that juxtaposes still and moving images, which has more recently become popular, is referred to as a cinemagraph. Cinemagraphs are usually displayed in the form of an animated GIF. Moreover, cinemagraphs commonly combine static scenes with a small repeating movement (e.g., a hair wisp blowing in the wind); thus, some motion and narrative can be captured in a cinemagraph. In a cinemagraph, the dynamic element is commonly looping in a sequence of frames.
Cinemagraphs are typically created from carefully staged and captured video or a series of photographs using complex, professional image editing tools. These conventional image editing tools, however, are time-consuming to use, and not easily accessible to an untrained user. Moreover, such tools typically do not provide various refinement operations used to overcome inconsistencies and artifacts that commonly arise when juxtaposing still and dynamic imagery.